Vegan Green Eggs- Who Needs the Ham!

Inspiration.  We interrupt our regularly scheduled Dad’s Dinner Diary post because I’m just so darn excited about something that happened this morning!  I’m often thinking of ways to make awesome food for my non meat eating kids, so you can imagine how excited I was when this idea hit me.  I am so frickin’ excited about this recipe, which ironically, came to me while I was butchering a couple pounds of chicken wings for the Steelers Browns game.  Now, if no one has already thought of this, it should break the internet, at least as much as a recipe with 11 instagram followers can break the internet.  Believe me, this is better than all those food trends- sheet pan dinners, Japanese egg salad, avocado toast, Unicorn this or that- it’s a game changer- an easy, healthy, delicious, attractive vegan breakfast!  So let’s get to it!  Am I using too many exclamation marks!!?- I can’t help it, that’s how excited I am!!!!!!!  Also, in my excitement to get this posted today, there may be more typos and grammatical errors than usual- sorry.

Prep Time: 10-15  minutes

Cook Time:  8 minutes, although I don’t like giving cooking times

Preheat: Fry Pan over medium high heat.

Servings: 4

GET YOUR STUFF OUT.

Tofu Fry Spice.

1/4 cup of rice flour

1 tablespoon nutritional yeast

2 teaspoons onion powder

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

Avocado Yolk.

2 avocados

Juice from the wedge of a lemon

Kosher salt and cracked black pepper to taste

Tofu Whites.

1 14 ounce block of extra firm tofu 

1-2 tablespoons canola oil

Cook and Play.  Tell your Smart Speaker to play your favorite song because I’m too excited to come up with a song to compliment vegan eggs right now. 

Tofu Fry Spice.

1. Mix 1/4 cup of rice flour, 1 tablespoon nutritional yeast, 2 teaspoons onion powder, 1 teaspoon garlic powder and 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt in a large, shallow bowl.

Avocado Mash.

1. Cut avocados in half, carefully pop out the giant seed with a knife and scoop out flesh into a bowl.  Mash avocados with a fork and mash in the juice from a wedge of lemon.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Tofu Whites.

1. Dry off your tofu block as best you can and remove a cylinder from the middle with the largest size biscuit cutter that does not extend beyond the block- sorry, you might have to buy a biscuit cutter but it’s so worth it!
2. Cut thin cross sections, the thinner the better (remember, you’re trying to replicate egg whites)- being careful, since tofu is rather delicate, like my feelings if you don’t think this recipe is amazing.
3. Use a thin spatula to transfer whites to a tea towel and carefully press down with another towel to remove as much moisture as you can. You could use paper towels, but my kids have made me environmentally responsible.
4. Carefully dredge the whites in the Tofu Fry Spice bowl.
5. Preheat a large non stick skillet over medium heat, and once you have good browning heat, add 1-2 tablespoon of canola oil and tofu whites until you get a nice brown crust on the whites- 3-4 minutes a side. If the all the whites won’t fit comfortably, cook in batches- you may need stinkin’ batches, in this case.
6. Take a tablespoon or so of your avocado mash, hand shape it into a yolk and place it in the center of a white; repeating for the remainder of the whites.  I’m sure you’ll have leftover mash.  Serve quickly or you’ll lose that wonderful crisp on the tofu whites!

The Dad Joke.  How could I resist the Dr. Seuss joke on this one.  One of my fond memories from the kids’ grammar school years, was Dr. Seuss Day, which was celebrated by wearing crazy hats to school.  Of particular note, was the year I wore a Donut Hat- a viking helmet with donuts threaded on the horns- more than a few kids called me “Donut Guy” for the rest of the year after that- can’t say I blame them.

The Key To The Recipe.  As you probably guessed, you need to be careful in handling your tofu whites at all times in this recipe.  Lifting them with a small spatula helps.

Special Equipment.  Biscuit Cutter.  When we lived down south, pretty much everyone, and especially their mama,  had a biscuit cutter, but if you live up north, you might not.  I would suggest you invest in one, it’s worth it just for this recipe.  You could shape your whites with a round cookie cutter, if you cut your cylinder into narrow cross sections, but I’d still buy a biscuit cutter, because then you can make biscuits too!

Ingredients of Note.  Tofu Fry Spice.  This is my go to spice mix for nice crispy tofu.  It’s easy to double, triple and so on and keep on hand if you’re one to fry or bake-fry up a lot of tofu. 

Why This Is Amazing!  First of all, any time you can get a Dr. Seuss reference in your recipe, it’s a win.  On top of that, the combination of thin tofu whites and the Tofu Fry Spice creates a flavorful, delicately crisp bite of food.  Some times rubs or marinades are lost in the mass of thicker slabs of bland tofu, but since the whites are so thin, the flavor and crisp of the rub shines through, while the tender bite of the interior white remains.  These are so much better than egg whites!  As for the avocado “yolk”- sure there are molecular gastronomy powders and potions or more complicated than they need to be vegan mixtures that can give you a yellow, runny yolk like substance, but why do you need to go to that artificial trouble when you have the natural goodness of avocado to lend its luscious mouth feel in place of the egg yolk- not to mention the nice balance of citrus and the fact that you’re making a green egg!  I’ve also seen vegan scrambled egg recipes that use tofu and Kala Namak to give off that egg vibe (not to say you couldn’t add kala namak, a sulfury spice, to your avocado mash), but I just like the look of a sunny side, in this case a Mars side, up egg!

Course:  breakfast 

Cuisine: ground breaking

Keyword: vegan, fun food, avocado, tofu

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